Island Heights cop charged with lying about firearm he owned after restraining order was issued, prosecutor says
ISLAND HEIGHTS - A borough police detective has been charged with providing a false report to law enforcement authorities after the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office said he lied about whether he still owned a gun following a temporary restraining order against him.
Matthew Curtis, 47, of Little Egg Harbor, has been suspended with pay from his more than $84,000-a-year position with the Island Heights Police Department, where he has served since July 2004, according to the Prosecutor’s Office and state pension records.
Prosecutor Bradley D. Billhimer said Tuesday that Curtis was also charged with contempt of a judicial or protective order, and being a certain person prohibited from possessing a weapon. The circumstances that led to the temporary restraining order — filed against him last spring — were not immediately available.
S. Karl Mohel, a Toms River-based defense attorney who is representing Curtis in the matter, said Wednesday that he is confident his client will be vindicated.
“The issue was that the gun was one of a multitude of weapons and it was a clerical error,” Mohel said. “There was no intent by my client other than to abide by the law.”
Because of the restraining order, Curtis had been required to surrender any firearms he owned or possessed at the time the order was issued on May 11. On that date, Curtis surrendered a number of weapons to law enforcement, the Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement.
Two days later, Curtis signed a letter advising authorities that he had sold three handguns registered to him before the temporary restraining order went into effect, according to the statement.
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However, the Prosecutor’s Office noted that a subsequent weapons trace conducted by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives found Curtis was still listed as the registered owner of the handguns he claimed he had sold.
On Dec. 11, Curtis filed a report with the Little Egg Harbor Police Department that three handguns were stolen from his personal vehicle outside the front of his home. Curtis had left his car unlocked at the time of the theft, the statement said.
One of the handguns he reported stolen was a firearm that he affirmed in May had been sold before the temporary restraining order was issued. The status of the other two handguns was not immediately clear.
The stolen weapon in question was later recovered from a suspect charged in Essex County with motor vehicle theft and eluding, all according to the Prosecutor’s Office.
Curtis was processed at the Ocean County Sheriff’s Office in Toms River on Tuesday and released on a summons pending a future appearance in state Superior Court, the statement said.
The Professional Standards Unit and Domestic Violence/Weapons Squad of the Prosecutor’s Office, the Little Egg Harbor Police Department and the ATF all participated in the investigation, Billhimer said.
Contact Asbury Park Press reporter Erik Larsen at elarsen@gannettnj.com.
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Island Heights police misconduct: Cop lied, provided false report
